Music Directors

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Lata Mangeshkar’s best songs by Hemant Kumar

Wishing a very Happy Birthday to Lata Mangeshkar (b. 28 September 1929) on her 88th birth anniversary and a tribute to Hemant Kumar (16 June 1920 – 26 September 1989) on his 28th death anniversary

Lata Mangeshkar and Hemant KumarHemant Kumar was endowed with one of the most sonorous voices in light music. His film songs are universally popular. His non-film Hindi songs are equally sweet. In Rabindrasangeet, he is regarded as a titan. He has composed music for a large number of Hindi and Bengali films. The sweetness of his voice has also dripped into the music he composed. The melody-incarnate Lata Mangeshkar became his natural choice for the female songs. One Hemant Kumar-Lata Mangeshkar combination I have already covered – his duets with her, and they are indeed out of this world. Just recall some of them: Aa neele gagan taley pyar hum karein, Chandan ka palna resham ki dori, Ye raat ye chaandni phir kahan, Badli mein chhupe chaand ne phir mujhse kaha hai, Ek baar zara phir kah do, Jaag dard-e-ishq jaag and Nain so nain naahi milaao. One more Hemant Kumar-Lata Mangeshkar combination has long been my great favourite – that is her solo songs composed by him.

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OP Nayyar’s influence on other Music Directors

Guest article by Ravindra Kelkar

(OP Nayyar was a craze for some years from the mid-50s. Every music director was imitating his style, composing OP-type songs from time to time. If you thought it was simply a bandwagon effect, our OP Nayyar-expert Ravindra Kelkar unravels several factors that were at play. Some did it voluntarily, some under producers’ pressure, and some also with the not so noble intention of cutting OP out – flood the market with OP-clones to drive out the original. According to Mr Kelkar’s fascinating thesis, even redoubtable names like Naushad, C Ramchandra and SD Burman were not untouched by the OP-influence. After his inaugural article on ‘The three distinct phases of OP Nayyar’s career’ and the second article on OP Nayyar-Geeta Dutt songs, Mr Kelkar comes up with another Ace on OP.  Just close your eyes and enjoy these ‘OP’ compositions by several other MDs, with profuse thanks to Mr Kelkar. – AK)

OP NayyarOP’s musical career took off from Aar Paar (1954). A succession of musical hits followed, in the next two years, like, Baap Re Baap (1955), Mr & Mrs 55 (1955), Musafirkhana (1955), Chhoomantar (1956), CID (1956), Hum Sab Chor Hain (1956), and many others. Some of them were big hits, however, most of the movies managed to recover the money invested by the producer, largely due to the lilting music by OP. His music had freshness, liveliness, was infectious, easy to identify with, easy to hum and it was distinctly different from others. He had created his own style. It was easy to guess the identity of the composer as soon as you listened to the intro music of the OP song. Even the title music of the films had an OP stamp. It would be typically breezy and include a clarinet/flute/violins combo piece as well as a sarangi piece. In fact, OP would try to compose the title music in such a way that he would time the clarinet piece or sarangi piece when the title would show “Music Composed by O.P. Nayyar” on the screen. All this created a certain mystique around the name of O.P. Nayyar. Also, OP was easy to work with as long as you paid his price and didn’t interfere with his work, by giving him full freedom in composition, selection of song writers and singers. He didn’t really care about the star cast, story, name of the banner etc.

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The first duo Husnlal-Bhagatram (2): Their songs for ‘other’ singers

(While I had already scheduled the first part and was working on the draft for this part on Husnlal-Bhagatram, I was also in touch with Pt Husnlal’s US-based son, Dinesh Kumar Prabhakar, and Pt Bhagtram’s Mumbai-based son, Ashok Bhagatram Sharma. Communication with Ashokji was difficult as he has kept himself outside the digital word, but I was delighted to get a call from Dineshji who was in Delhi, and I had a most memorable meeting with him and his mother, the 90-year old Nirmala Devi, the wife of late Pt Husnlal. I have incorporated the gist of my conversation with them in the later part of this post.)

Husnlal-BhagatramHusnlal-Bhagatram shone like a meteor very briefly, during 1948-51, when their main singers were predominantly Lata Mangeshkar, Suraiya and Rafi. During this period, they created some absolutely mesmerising songs, but in many songs there was a repetitiveness in the melody and orchestration. In the Golden Era of playback singers, they did not diversify much beyond their above preferred singers. Thus, they were behind the curve when Mukesh and Talat Mahmood were creating waves. However, whenever they used them, HB showed their immense potential, for example in Kismat bigadi duniya badli (Mukesh, Afsana, 1951), or Ai meri zindagi tujhe dhoondhoon kahan (Talat Mahmood, Adal-e-Jahangir, 1955). If there was any doubt that they had a limited range, they dispelled it with an absolutely superb song in Kishore Kumar’s voice (duet with Lata Mangeshkar), Lahron se pooch lo ki kinaaron se pooch lo (Kafila, 1952). We also get a sprinkling of some nice songs in Shamshad Begum’s voice.

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OP Nayyar-Geeta Dutt: A peerless combination

A tribute to Geeta Dutt on her 45th death anniversary (23 November 1930 – 20 July 1972) by guest author Ravindra Kelkar

(A general grievance against SoY is that Geeta Dutt has not been given her due place on the blog. There has been one exclusive post on her best songs by SD Burman which, too, incidentally appeared on her death anniversary, four years ago. My post on SD Burman’s best duets for Rafi, too, contained some songs with her. Her songs have also appeared in some other contexts. However, I am aware this is not commensurate with her appeal among music lovers. I was waiting for a worthier person to do justice to her. My wish was granted when our OP Nayyar-expert, Ravindra Kelkar offered to write a series of articles on OPN. His first article giving an overview of three distinct phases of OPN’s career was highly acclaimed. Continuing his series, he comes up with another outstanding article, on OPN-Geeta Dutt combination, as a tribute to her on her 45th death anniversary. I am sure this would more than recompense for my omission. Thanks a lot Mr Kelkar. – AK)

OP Nayyar-Geeta DuttOP Nayyar-Geeta Dutt association started right from OP’s first film Aasman in 1952, in which Geeta Dutt sang 4 solos. It ended with Ragini in the year 1958. She sang in 22 of OP’s films for 62 songs, which included 35 solos, 22 male duets, all with Rafi, and 5 female duets, all with Asha Bhosle. During their association in Aasman, she was impressed with OP’s potential and recommended his name to his would-be husband Guru Dutt for his maiden venture Baaz (1953), and as everybody knows it was the success of Guru Dutt’s next film Aar Paar (1954) which launched OP’s career. So, he had a lot to be grateful to Geeta Dutt.

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The first duo Husnlal-Bhagatram (1): Their songs for Suraiya, Lata Mangeshkar and Rafi

Husnlal-BhagatramI have signed off the series on Shankar-Jaikishan recently. Before that I had done series on Anil Biswas, Naushad, C Ramchandra and SD Burman. As the readers now expect the next famous music directors in line, there are some yesteryears stalwarts who shone like meteor for a short while, or who gave great music consistently over a long period, but who were not lucky to get sustained commercial success. Though not counted among the G-5 or G-7, they are very dear to the lovers of songs of yore. I was always conscious while doing the series on the superstars that I have to take care that we don’t miss the lesser, but no less talented stars. Husnlal-Bhagatram occupy a very important place in the history of film music as a bridge between the vintage and the golden era, between the theatre-style singing of Zohra Ambalewali, Zeenat Begum and Amirbai Karnataki, and the smooth, melodious singing of Suraiya and Lata Mangeshkar, between GM Durrani and Rafi.

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Shankar Jaikishan’s duets (2)

Shankar JaikishanIn the first part of Shankar-Jaikishan’s duets, I covered the songs in which either Mukesh or Rafi sang with a female singer. They being the predominant singers, one would think that that post would cover most of the famous duets composed by them. But SJ were hugely talented and diversified, and played a key role in introducing or boosting the career of many singers. Subir Sen, who was among the top singers of Bengali songs, is mainly their gift to Hindi film music. Mukesh’s forays into acting and film production gave an opening for Manna Dey as the voice of Raj Kapoor, and SJ created some iconic duets like Pyar hua iqaraar hua, Aa ja sanam madhu chaandni mein hum, Ye raat bhigi bhigi etc. Even though SD Burman gave Manna Dey his first big hit Upar gagan vishal, and was his uncle KC Dey’s protégé, Manna Dey credited SJ more for giving him prominence. We have also seen that SJ used Talat Mahmood’s voice in at least nine films, more than most composers, though they may not be counted among the elite group who gave the best songs for him. They have used Hemant Kumar sparingly, but they managed to compose a couple of his greatest duets.

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Shankar-Jaikishan’s duets (1): Mukesh/Rafi with female singers

Shankar JaikishanIn the last calendar year I did a series of posts on Shankar-Jaikishan’s songs: singerwise for Lata Mangeshkar, Mukesh, Rafi, Manna Dey, ‘Other singers’ and two posts on their dance songs – for Lata Mangeshkar and female dance duets. Several readers rightly remarked that SJ’s series would not be complete without covering their duets. That is true for all top MDs, but more so for SJ because they dominated the scene during the heydays of ‘Bollywood’ – when our films moved away from social issues of factory workers, farmer’s indebtedness and poverty to song and dance romance; when the heroes and heroines went to Kashmir and danced around flowers. We had not become affluent, but we went to cinema to suspend our disbelief and escape for three hours in darkness to the dream world of glamorous stars gallivanting on the screen.

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Shamshad Begum with 3G

A tribute on Shamshad Begum’s 98th birth anniversary (14 April 1919 – 23 April 2013), and  wishing the readers a very happy Baisakhi, Vishu, Bihu and Tamil New Year.

Shamshad BegumShamshad Begum has been a perennial favourite on SoY. Earlier, there was a reference to the great trinity of Naushad, C Ramchandra and OP Nayyar who arguably gave the best songs for her. (Incidentally, besides these three I also wrote a post on her best songs by SD Burman, under the title “East meets West”.) If you look a little earlier, and a little more carefully, there was another trinity who composed great songs for her. I call them the 3G, for Ghulam Haider, Ghulam Mohammad and Pt Govind Ram.  I am presenting her best songs by the 3G as my tribute to her on her 98th birth anniversary.

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The three distinct phases of OP Nayyar’s career

A tribute to OP Nayyar on his 10th death anniversary (16 January 1926 – 28 January 2007) by guest author Ravindra Kelkar (After I had written on OP Nayyar’s best songs for Mahendra Kapoor, Rafi, Shamshad Begum and Asha Bhosle, I had no intention of writing any more on him. But the readers’ clamour for ‘YeREAD THE FULL ARTICLE

Best songs of 1949: Final Wrap Up 5

The SoY Award for the Best Music Director goes to?

Anil Biswas_Shankar-Jaikishan_Naushad_Khemchand Prakash_C Ramchandra_Husnlal-BhagatramFor the final wrap up, I can do no better than quote Mahesh: “The year 1949 itself was the biggest winner of all.” That refers to the historical place of the year in the evolution of Hindi film songs which we have discussed in the overview post, as well as in the various wrap ups: Wrap Up 1 (Best male solos), Wrap Up 2 (Best solos of ‘other’ female singers), Wrap Up 3 (Best solos of Lata Mangeshkar) and Wrap Up 4 (Best duets). In brief, there were two watershed events that changed the course of film songs. Lata Mangeshkar’s coming as a Tsunami shook the established order of the full-throated vintage era singers – her high-pitched thin voice becoming the industry standard for female playback singing for leading ladies. This started the era of Lata Mangeshkar versus ‘others’. Shankar-Jaikishan had a sensational debut with Barsaat in which they came with a unique orchestration, which was easy on the ears and extremely melodious. For the next twenty years they would be counted among the five most dominant music directors.

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